Various gameplay thoughts

[HunterZ]

Been having a blast playing the FTL beta this week. Here are some thoughts that have occurred to me while playing:

• It would be really helpful for new players if the game showed tooltips when you hover over enemy system icons, as it is possible to encounter ships with cloaking devices and such before the player is able to acquire them.
• Because of some strange game logic with their special ability, having a Zoltan crew member pass through rooms in your ship can have some undesired effects. I'm pretty sure I've had them cause weapon systems to go inactive that were active when they entered the room, for example.
• In order to stop firing a weapon without powering it down, I have to anachronistically act as if I'm going to re-target it but then cancel the targeting action (thus targeting nothing). A button and/or hotkey to clear the target might be preferable.
• When attempting to click on doors to toggle them, nothing happens the first time. Some people may like this as a feature that prevents accidental clicks, but I find it a bit annoying.
• It might be nice to be able to have a "chained" weapons mode where all weapons charge before any weapons fire, and then they all fire in the sequence of their hotkey/position number. Because shields regenerate so quickly, it seems worthless to have a weaker-but-faster weapon that's always going off after an enemy's shields have recovered from a stronger-but-slower hit a couple seconds earlier.
• Teleporters ought to be nerfed a bit, at least on easy mode. It seems that every time I encounter an enemy with one, they manage to beam some guys over before I can do anything - even though I immediately pause the game and target all my weapons at the teleporter system as soon as I jump in. At the very least, they shouldn't work through shields (if they do - I'm not sure). Also, I've noticed that 2-3 guys always seem to beam over, which is kind of harsh considering that the player only starts out with 3 crew in total.
• It would be really, really helpful if hovering over a beacon on the sector map would temporarily show the dotted lines (perhaps in a different color) to the other beacons that can be reached from there - at least for visited beacons. I often find myself agonizing over whether I should risk exploring a beacon due to the currently unknown risk of having to backtrack in the case that the destination under consideration is just slightly too far from another beacon that I'm trying to eventually reach; I find that this agonizing is not fun.
• Having to upgrade both your reactor capacity and a specific system in order to make that specific system more effective generally feels like a double penalty. I understand that this mechanic is in place because (1) you want to allow players to be able to juggle a shared pool of energy amongst various systems, and (2) it costs different amounts to upgrade the capacity of different specific systems.

[Watashiii]

Yes, teleporters would be cooler if they had charging times like the weapons have

As for reactor capacity, it would be awesome if the ships had less reactor levels or more levels of other equipment. That way, it would encourage people to do a lot more power transfers depending on the situation and damage

[HumbleSloth]

When attempting to click on doors to toggle them, nothing happens the first time. Some people may like this as a feature that prevents accidental clicks, but I find it a bit annoying.

I think this is a little more subtle than your language indicates. Doors only require one click, but you have to have no crew members selected. So I would guess you are noticing two clicks because you have a crew member selected so your first click is to unselect and the second is to activate a door.

[HunterZ]

When attempting to click on doors to toggle them, nothing happens the first time. Some people may like this as a feature that prevents accidental clicks, but I find it a bit annoying.

I think this is a little more subtle than your language indicates. Doors only require one click, but you have to have no crew members selected. So I would guess you are noticing two clicks because you have a crew member selected so your first click is to unselect and the second is to activate a door.

Hmm, yeah you're probably right. I hadn't thought of that.

[azurereaver]

• It would be really helpful for new players if the game showed tooltips when you hover
• It might be nice to be able to have a "chained" weapons mode where all weapons charge before any weapons fire, and then they all fire in the sequence of their hotkey/position number. Because shields regenerate so quickly, it seems worthless to have a weaker-but-faster weapon that's always going off after an enemy's shields have recovered from a stronger-but-slower hit a couple seconds earlier.
• Teleporters ought to be nerfed a bit
• It would be really, really helpful if hovering over a beacon on the sector map would temporarily show the dotted lines (perhaps in a different color) to the other beacons that can be reached from there - at least for visited beacons.
• Having to upgrade both your reactor capacity and a specific system in order to make that specific system more effective generally feels like a double penalty. I understand that this mechanic is in place because (1) you want to allow players to be able to juggle a shared pool of energy amongst various systems, and (2) it costs different amounts to upgrade the capacity of different specific systems.

I think the more tool tips the better. Also being able to access the achievements list from within a game.

Chaining weapons by having them powered but not targeted and then pausing and firing them both at the same time is part of the fun! I found auto-fire is a crutch that screws you up more often than not (ever blow up a ship with your boarding crew still on it? ow)

When you started a sentence with teleporters needing to be nerfed I thought you were going to say the player's teleporter, not the enemy. In the situation you cite you have to retreat and fight them in your medbay. Also cloaking will stop them from boarding for the duration, and give your weapons time to charge, but you still won't be able to blow the teleporter before they can get aboard, the best you could do is teleport aboard them FIRST.

I think it would be fair to show beacon paths for visited nodes. Not showing them for unvisited nodes is a tension device. Although allowing some paths to be revealed when you get 'sensor data' of a region might be nice.

The double penalty seems fine to me. You can't power all your systems at once, you can't have full shields and full weapons and full engine. I'm thankful we get the doors, camera, and helm power for free.

[fall_ark]

The teleporter thing would be a nice change. Heck, there's even a Teleporter Preigniter augmentation in the data file.
But there is something attractive about an instant board...and having to fight 4-5 boarders in a Mantis/Pirate encounter. God I hate those.

[Matthew]

Cooldowns on teleporters wasn't fun. All it did was mean your first shot hits their teleporter, and then combat proceeds as normal from there. Enemy ships that relied on teleporters were not threatening or interesting. And you normally would destroy/heavily damage their ship before *your* teleporter was ready so boarding wasn't fun as a player either. It was tested thoroughly and I promise it's better the way it is

This is one of the reasons that the Zoltan Ships exists however. It does provide that dynamic of a "charging" teleporter since their Energy Shield blocks teleporting. It's fun that it's a new playstyle with (or against) those ships and it switches up the pace / expectations. It's just not fun if it's every ship all the time.

[fall_ark]

Cooldowns on teleporters wasn't fun. All it did was mean your first shot hits their teleporter, and then combat proceeds as normal from there. Enemy ships that relied on teleporters were not threatening or interesting. And you normally would destroy/heavily damage their ship before *your* teleporter was ready so boarding wasn't fun as a player either. It was tested thoroughly and I promise it's better the way it is

This is one of the reasons that the Zoltan Ships exists however. It does provide that dynamic of a "charging" teleporter since their Energy Shield blocks teleporting. It's fun that it's a new playstyle with (or against) those ships and it switches up the pace / expectations. It's just not fun if it's every ship all the time.

Plus they are Zoltans. No defense against teleporter would just be Intergalactic Species Cruelty.

Unless it's your ship, then scripted events put enemies on your ship just fine....

[HunterZ]

When you started a sentence with teleporters needing to be nerfed I thought you were going to say the player's teleporter, not the enemy. In the situation you cite you have to retreat and fight them in your medbay. Also cloaking will stop them from boarding for the duration, and give your weapons time to charge, but you still won't be able to blow the teleporter before they can get aboard, the best you could do is teleport aboard them FIRST.

I don't find it fun to know that as soon as I spot a ship with a teleporter (except for the flagship for some reason, which never seems to use it - at least on easy mode), I'm guaranteed to be boarded before I can do anything about it. Even a level 2 cloak doesn't buy enough time for any level of weapon to charge that can take it out - even with drones and such.

It sounds like unlocking more ships is the intended way to blunt whichever mechanic(s) happen to be most aggravating to a particular player. So far I've only unlocked the Engi ship, but I seem to do a lot better with it than I have with the Kestrel.

I still haven't been able to beat the flagship on easy mode, though; I suspect I'm not finding the right balance of upgrades, or I'm using bad tactics, or something. Time to watch some Youtube videos for hints I guess

I think it would be fair to show beacon paths for visited nodes. Not showing them for unvisited nodes is a tension device. Although allowing some paths to be revealed when you get 'sensor data' of a region might be nice.

I'm on board with all of your points. I could go either way on showing paths for unvisited nodes, though.

The double penalty seems fine to me. You can't power all your systems at once, you can't have full shields and full weapons and full engine. I'm thankful we get the doors, camera, and helm power for free.

My reaction wasn't about what you can or can't do in total, but more about the fact that you more or less always have to buy two upgrades to increase one capability each time you upgrade a system: the system itself, plus the reactor. You could just as easily make the reactor level a passive sum of all system maximums - with the same ceiling that the reactor level currently has - and then increase all system upgrade costs slightly, and it wouldn't change a thing other than how I perceive it


Also, more on Zoltan crew member issues: I had to fight the game really hard at one point to get my Zoltan crew member's energy bonus to apply to my engines properly. I believe I had level 4 engines with 3 reactor energy applied, and it kept overlapping the Zoltan bonus with the 3rd energy bar instead of putting the bonus towards the 4th level. This prevented me from being able to save an energy bar for use with another system until I was able to juggle things around enough to make it work as expected. My memory is fuzzy now, but it may or may not have been related to upgrading the engines while the Zoltan bonus was already active.

[Matthew]

HunterZ, I think you're underestimating the value of upgrading a system without upgrading the reactor. I will often have my systems upgraded beyond my capacity to fully power all of them. Since you can rearrange your power to suit the situation, it's worth the cost to be ready for multiple situations as opposed to maxing out your ability to power every situation. And, more importantly, an empty power bar is far from worthless. That's more health and defense for a system. Having a buffer to soak up damage and not kill your weapon cooldowns or drop your shields the instant the system is damaged is vital to victory.

I'll check out your issue with upgrading engines while a Zoltan is in the room. The Zoltans have certainly had many bugs in the past. They can be a little tricky to get used to, but some players have found them to be their favorite race once they get past the additional difficulties in managing them.